


baby, we'll be fine

by zauberer_sirin



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Dancing, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, First Kiss, Flirting, Fluff and Angst, POV Skye (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.), post-episode 2x04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-20
Updated: 2014-10-20
Packaged: 2018-02-21 22:37:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,114
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2484803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zauberer_sirin/pseuds/zauberer_sirin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Skye is resenting she didn't get to have any fun during their latest mission. Coulson tries to make it up to her. Things escalate.</p><p>(More post-2x04 "Face My Enemy" fix-it fluff)</p>
            </blockquote>





	baby, we'll be fine

She loses sense of time for a bit here. 

One moment Trip was here with her and the next she looks around and everything is dark and deserted. So much that her eyes have to adjust to everything again. Where has the afternoon gone? And the evening? And why hasn't anyone come by to say something to her? Not that she is the inviting type these days. And with Simmons gone and Fitz finding her (and everybody, she can only guess) less approachable than he just to... there's really no one to notice. Trip is good at respecting her distance. So she's alone.

"It's two in the morning," Coulson points out when he catches her in the meeting room.

Skye looks up. His suit looks a bit less perfect than when he slip back into it after the mission was gone.

"It's two in the morning for you too."

"I'm the Director." Skye makes an amused sound at the back of her throat. He takes a look at what she's working on. "Still with that?"

She has gone back to the first batch of images Coulson gave her.

"You asked me to look into the symbols. I'm trying to be thorough."

There's a moment of shadow in his eyes. Skye knows he's lying about the drawings, of course. Or at least he's not telling the whole truth. To Skye that feels pretty much the same.

"Don't let me interrupt you."

"No, I was finished for today," she replies, turning off the laptop. "It is two in the morning after all, and some of us have had a long day of work."

"I've had a hard day of work," he replies.

"Yeah, but you got to have fun _and_ dance?"

"Still sore?"

"Under cover fun and dancing. It's all I'm saying."

She gives it a little shrug, but even she can tell it's not selling well.

"Is everything okay?" Coulson asks.

She lifts her face towards him. She didn't think she'd be this stunned by a simple question. Then anger rises to the surface. It doesn't take much, she didn't keep it buried that deep.

"Wow. Did it pain you to ask me that?" she says. "Are you sure you are interested in whether or not I'm okay? Don't you want to tell me how undercover works once more?"

She's never been confrontational before.

What does she have to lose? She's already lost everything – _melodramatic much, Skye? get a grip on yourself_. She could lose his respect but. She always thought respect came with trust and Coulson obviously doesn't trust her. She always thought respect – or specifically his respect – was something warm and Coulson is cold now.

"Skye."

"No, I'm not letting that one go that easily. It's my team too. You can't humilliate me like that in front of them. I mean, well, _you can_ obviously. Sorry, this sounded more authoritative in my mind."

He seems to concede that point at least: "I might have been overly..."

"Snippy?"

"Strict."

She sighs. Okay, fine, he can have it his way. He's going to have it his way, in any case. She's not wasting more energy in the wrong tactic.

"I get it," she says, and tries smiling at him, changing gears. "But you can't exactly blame me for wanting in on all the fun and dancing."

"It was a mission."

"It was fun and dancing. _And_ free alcohol and food. That's my siren's song, sir. That's my thing."

He seems amused for a moment then he seems to remember that he doesn't want to be around her. He looks at the door, like he is trying to find an excuse to leave. To leave her here.

"I know I'm being this big nuisance to you right now, but I'm really trying not to be," Skye says.

It's not that she quite believes what she is saying. But it's close, and it's a good tactic.

Like every time lately Coulson just seems to get impatient with her so soon. Eager to change the subject, any subject, every subject.

"That's not what's happening."

"Isn't it? Then what exactly is happening?" He doesn't reply. "Okay. See?"

She wishes she hadn't turn off her laptop already so that she could have something else to focus and pretend she's not just avoiding looking at him now. Why does every interaction with him become the hardest thing she's ever done? It used to be so easy. Well, not easy. It wasn't ever exactly easy between them, but it wasn't this.

Skye feels like he is about to speak again. He has this face – it's snippy? No, _strict_. He's probably going to tell her off again. She is quicker, waving her hand in a "forget it" gesture.

"Don't worry," she says, trying not too make it too obvious the words make it out through her teeth. "I'm not going to be a problem for you. I'll stay back here and do my job quietly, you don't have to – I'm good, okay? I'm not going to bother you."

Coulson looks at her for what seems like a really long time. Specially under the circumstances. But he's looking at her like a puzzle.

"When did you learn to do that?" he asks.

"What?"

"How old were you? The first time you imagined that if you were quiet enough, obedient enough, if you didn't bother people maybe you could stay. Ten? Eleven?"

Skye can't believe he said that, went there.

"What the hell, Director?"

He curls his fingers around the back of a chair. "Skye, I can assure you whatever you think is going here... None of this is your fault. You haven't done anything wrong. Nobody is leaving you behind, and nobody is going to kick you out."

"Whatever _I think_ is going on here? That's not what I'm worried about," she tells him, raising her voice a bit.

He's either being willingly thick or he doesn't know her at all.

"And I don't want a freaking surrogate family," she explains. She didn't think that needed any clearing up. "You're not – Look, I don't need any kind of special treatment. I don't need attention. I don't even need for things to go back the way they were. The only thing I really want is to know if you are okay. Honestly."

Something in his face changes, relaxes. 

"You said you wanted fun and dancing," he reminds her.

He's probably just trying to get her to drop it, which, _gladly_. And she prefers this tone of his, anyway.

"That would be nice but I don't see much fun and dancing in my future. I'll settle for you telling me you're fine," she comments.

Again he looks at her way too long for how things are between them.

"Come with me," he tells her.

 

 

"This is very out of character for you," she tells Coulson.

She's not complaining, exactly. Taking her to the one of the common rooms, plugging Billy's collector's jukebox from the 80s, which in all honesty she always assumed didn't work at all and was there for awful decor. And now he's asked her to dance with him, if she really was so bummed about the whole not going undercover thing.

"Is it? Out of character? I'd like to think it's not."

She wonders if he is drunk or something. But that would be more out of character, even.

"Coulson," she says, eyeing him. "You've barely spoken a word to me in weeks. Barely spoken a word to me in six months. And now you want to dance?"

"It's not an official order. You could just not do it."

"No, no, it's just..."

She doesn't want to admit the truth.

"What?" he asks, cocking his head to see her face.

"You've called my bluff, sir. I didn't really mean it when I said I wanted to dance. I would want to but. I don't know how to. Dance, that is. I don't know how to."

"It's really easy, just follow my lead."

The music is some stupid ballad and it's not really playing loud – it's the middle of the night – but it's enough to give them a line of rhythm.

There's a kind of inertia to the way she just takes Coulson's hand like that, as if there was no other alternative. At this point refusing to dance would be more awkward than dancing, she guesses – she didn't start the day thinking she'd end up dancing with Director Coulson. She didn't start the day thinking they'd be exchanging this many words, if she is being honest.

They are dancing. Which should probably blow all the fuses in Skye's mind if it weren't for the fact that this is much better than their current situation. At least he's talking to her. More than talking, apparently. He's swaying both their bodies quite smoothly and easily to the music. Stiff as Skye is, she is at least able to just let him do everything.

Coulson is holding her quite close and there's no way this is professional or professionally sanctioned or whatever. He seems to have forgotten himself for a moment.

"Is this as fun as you imagined? Dancing with me?" he asks.

Skye snorts and his voice is enough to relax her, she's not resting her hand on his shoulder so awkwardly now.

"Who said I wanted to dance _with you_? I wanted to dance with Agent May."

He chuckles.

"It's weird," she admits. It's many other things as well, things she had forgotten how to want, because he started pulling away and Skye started wanting smaller and smaller things, her shrinking hopes didn't extent to feeling the beatland of Coulson's body where their palms and fingers meet, like this.

"Weird doesn't necessarily mean bad," Coulson says, voice like a dream or an old movie.

She gives him a suspicious smile. "Careful, sir, I think you are getting flirty."

"If it bothers you, you can pretend we are undercover."

"I'd much rather pretend Director Coulson wanted to flirt with me."

"Or you don't have to pretend," he says, cautiously enough that it doesn't sound pushy.

Yeah, pushy is not how Skye would define Coulson's behavior towards her, ever.

He has his hand almost twisted into the fabric of her t-shirt at the small of her back and his body is so close Skye can tell she's wrinkling his suit.

"Is this what you do on your missions?" she asks, not wanting to mistake his intensity right now for something else. "You always get... like this?"

She tries to gesture but she has both hands busy. She manages, somehow, tapping her fingers on his shoulder.

"I'm not on a mission right now," he replies, again with the faraway tone.

The way he is looking at her – something has changed.

Everything has changed.

And she likes it. But this close, touching intimately like this, Skye notices other things too.

"Coulson. What's wrong?"

"What do you mean?" he asks.

"Your hand. It's shaking."

The faraway and dreamlike look is gone in the blink of an eye. He stops and takes his hand, both his hands, away from Skye as fast as he manages, like it burns. And he steps back, looking at her, as she had done something wrong. It only lasts a moment but she can see that in his eyes.

He backs himself towards the door, against the couch he had previously pushed back a bit so they'd have space to dance. He makes a gesture towards the jukebox but he didn't need to, Skye was already walking to turn it off.

Coulson lets himself fall on the couch, grabbing his hand.

There's a bit of static energy still in the air or music lingering in the room or in her ears but when Skye turns around and sees him, as a shape, almost unfamiliar, doubled over his knees, it feels surreal. He was so close a moment ago – Skye could feel his body heat, could feel his pulse when she held his hand, and almost taste his breath because they were so close and it was so magically late into the night and unexpected.

Now he seems miles away. More than that, Skye feels frightened of approaching him.

But she does anyway, walking slowly to the couch.

"That shouldn't have happened," he says.

"What? The dancing?" Skye asks.

He nods, dropping his gaze, in obvious pain.

That's more in character for him, she thinks, saying that.

"Do you want me to call anyone? May...?"

He shakes his head. "It will pass in a moment."

There's a horrible familiarity about it in his tone.

She sits by his side on the couch. He gives the gesture a sideways glance but it's not – he _doesn't hate it_ , there' something more complex here. The way he's cowering, if subtly, from her. It disturbs Skye. He's not the cowering type.

"You mean... this happens often?" she asks.

This time Coulson doesn't reply but it's implicit in the silence that yeah, it happens often.

Then she sees him grit his teeth.

"I'm sorry. I forgot myself for a moment. This was stupid and dangerous," he says, shaking his head at himself. "I shouldn't have."

She draws a breath before sliding on the couch a bit, closer to him.

"Coulson, I know you don't want to talk. To me. At all. But you have to talk. Now."

It doesn't come out harsh like she thought it would, when she would eventually get the courage to say the words she has rehearsed many times these months. A revenge fantasy of some sort. But now that the moment has arrived it's not like that at all. Now that the moment has arrived Skye finds herself being kind.

He nods. she can tell that if he was in any pain it is over now. He's in the aftermath of some panic and she can hear his breathing but it's not laboured, just loud.

"I've been lying to you," he starts.

Skye makes what she hopes is a very hilarious face.

"Shocking news," she says. "Give me a minute here to process."

"Jokes. Good. What I need." His tone is lighter too.

"Sorry. But I've kind of earned it."

"I guess you have."

He purses his lips while looking at her softly and that's almost a smile. And it's almost companionable. Like he is glad she is here in this moment with him. This hasn't happened in a long time. Warmth pools in Skye's stomach.

Skye touches his shoulder and he flinches a bit.

"Are you scared of me?" she asks.

"A bit," he says, with a tired smile.

And he has seen that face. It's the same face Fitz has when he is desperatedly searching for a word but the word seems hopelessly and forever lost in the dark. Skye looks around the room. At three in the morning this is as much privacy as they can want, but she stills worries about Coulson and is suddenly aware of every little noise surrounding him, disturbing him.

"I'm dying," Coulson says eventually, finally, with finality. "Best case scenario is I'm dying. Worst case... there won't be a worse case scenario, I won't allow it. Maybe I just wanted to have one last dance with someone. Before this is all over. Not on a mission, not while undercover. Just – this. Dancing with someone who really likes me. Lik _ed_ me, anyway."

"You're dying," Skye says.

He flexes his index, pointing at her knee, saying, "I had hoped you might overlook that point."

"You're not dying."

"No, I'm pretty sure I am."

"Yeah no that's not going to happen," Skye repeats. "But tell me the whole story."

"The symbols I had you investigate. Garrett didn't write them. The first ones he did. But the others... I wrote them." He frowns at her lack of reaction. "You're not surprised."

"It was one of the million options I had imagined."

And worse. She had imagined much worse.

 

 

He tells her everything.

Okay, he tells her too much.

There are things Skye wishes she could unhear. Like the most gruesome details of Project TAHITI, his involvement. The fact that he dared take life advice from Grant Freaking Ward. The fact that he ever searched for the truth in Ward's statements in the first place. The symptoms – how it feels while he is writing the symbols, conscious but not really. The idea that he will either lose his mind in the same way like the other project subjects or that he will lose his mind like John Garrett. How he can't allow that. His worst fears (for himself, for Skye). His plans and preparations. How, if he can't have control over his life, he needs to have control over his death. At least this second time.

 

 

"I don't believe for one second that you have given up hope," she points out, when they have both calmed down a bit. "Not really."

She hasn't cried. Which is good. She's proud of that. She doesn't know how long he has been talking. A long time. They are still on the couch but something has somehow changed. Everything has changed for the second time this night.

"I just told you," Coulson argues. "I have made arrengements to be put down. It's over for me. We need to research this thing but – there's nothing left for me to try."

"That's crap. And you know how I know that's crap? Because you've just told me. And there's no way in hell that you didn't know that I'd eventually find a way to save you."

"Skye."

"And I will. I saved you once. And you saved me. We'll just have to save each other again."

She kisses him.

It's very impulsive, granted, but they have bigger problems.

He doesn't kiss back. Expected. But it doesn't matter.

She realizes something. About Coulson. About why he does things.

"That's why you didn't tell me, right?" she says, arching one eyebrow at him. "Because you knew I was going to kick your ass into doing something."

He looks embarrassed. Maybe he didn't realize what he was doing. Skye wonders if he does that often – do things without knowing what they mean. Like dancing with her. And some things only become full of clear sense later, after he's done them. At least she knows – she knows why she wanted to kiss someone she liked. She fears it's in case he's right and he's dying. Part of it, anyway. The _now_ part, not the _why_ part.

"You're really going to do it," he says, admiration in his voice. Admiration for her. It sounds like it was always there. "Aren't you?"

"What? Save you? Yes. Yes, I am. We will do it together."

He is touching his fingers to the line of his mouth.

"Relax, Coulson," she says. "It was just a kiss. I know you are in no condition to start something with me right now."

He shifts in his seat, getting even closer to her. They are not touching but they might as well be.

"And are you?" he asks. "In a condition to start something."

"Fair enough," she admits, and it's a good thing Coulson thinks about it from her point of view, too. "The last guy I liked turned out to be a Nazi and a serial killer. And he's still into me. So. Yes, part of me wonders what's so awful inside me that he'd..."

She drops her gaze.

"You know that's not true," Coulson says.

"Some days I know it. Other days, not so much."

Coulson cups her chin gently in his hand and brings his lips to hers.

It's not that she wants to complain; she doesn't, she opens her mouth under Coulson's and even though they are a bit too shy and cautious about it his tongue slides inside for a moment, still sweet and still delicate, but with more intent than her earlier kiss.

It's a great kiss – she always imagined Coulson would be a great kisser – but she suspects of the motives.

When she pulls away his eyes are a bit glazed over, his lips slightly parted for a moment longer.

"A pity kiss," she says. "Nice."

Coulson focuses. "It wasn't pity."

"Guilt?"

He leans back on the seat, touches his tie for a moment, like he just remembered he was wearing it.

"Guilt would be simpler," he tells her. There's some sort of embarrassed delight mixed there, besides his usual weight-of-the-world attitude. "This is inconvenient. It's not a good time."

"No," Skye agrees. "And I used to think that was important. Timing. Not messing things up."

"Do you still think that?" Coulson asks in a small, hopeful voice.

"Right now? No."

"Me neither."

She kisses him again.

And he kisses her again.

This time, _properly_.

He smiles a bit when he finishes, narrowing his eyes like he's not sure that was a good idea.

"Yeah, maybe we should work on you saving my life first," he says.

"So you're convinced we can?"

"No. But you are. And I trust your judgement more."

"History is on my side," Skye says. "So now what?"

His shoulders tense.

"I don't know," he says, looking lost. "I don't know how safe it is for you to be around me. But I want you to be around me."

She touches the back of his hand a moment, gingerly, like she could hurt him and not the other way around like he fears.

"Can we go to your room?" Skye asks. She notices his look. She rolls her eyes. "Not for that, charm school. That's going to take us a while. But I'd like to... just be with you."

 

 

Weird things she is thinking about right now: that somehow Coulson's bed is harder than hers. She's not sure she likes it yet.

She's lying on her side and so is he, so they can look at each other. His room as a bit sad – and yes, she has been curious, she has always been curious about all things Phil Coulson, even before she was, ehem, _curious_ about all things Phil Coulson – with no trace of his collector mania in sight.

He loosens his tie a bit more, but neither makes any attempt at removing their clothes. She knows intimacy is not possible for him right now. Or a greater degree of intimacy than lying here, together, close, on his bed. For that he would have to believe he has a future first. He'll get there. She'll get him there. She's not sure she's ready either; she wasn't lying, the whole thing with Ward had her believe there is something intrinsecally wrong with her and she still can't shake that notion. She'll get there. Coulson will get her there.

"You look tired," she says.

"I am tired."

"Well, it is four in the morning."

"I didn't mea–"

"I know what you meant."

She reaches her hand a moment to runs her fingers through his hair, right by his temple. She thinks there's more gray there than it used to, and maybe it's an illusion but she thinks of telling him but she decides to spare him. She can tease him later, tomorrow, she's tired too. And she likes it, anyway.

"You were right, by the way," she tells him, resting her hand on the pillow, right besides his face.

"About what?" Coulson asks.

"About wanting to dance with someone who likes you. Because I do. I like you."

He gives her a sleepy smirk. "I figured as much."

It seems like he is about to drift off. Well, he does look like he needs it. She wonders if he's sleeping much. She wonders if there are nightmares. She wonders if he is afraid of the night because he thinks he has so little time. She feels simultaneously very close to Coulson and very far too, thinking about this stuff.

"Skye..." he calls out and maybe it's important, what he wants to tell her, but Skye has to believe there will be time for important things.

There will be time.

"Rest," she tells him. "We have a long battle ahead of us. And we're starting tomorrow."

"You keep using that word," he says. He has his eyes closed already.

"What word?"

" _We_."

"I never stopped. You were the one who stopped."

"I'm sorry," he says, searching for her hand over the pillow.

He falls asleep with his fingers around Skye's.

She smiles against the light noise of his breathing. She doesn't want to go to sleep yet but she closes her eyes, enjoys the warmth and the presence of someone else with her. Someone she likes.

They'll get there together.


End file.
